


What You Left Behind

by SylphofScript



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Implied sexy times, M/M, Not as sad as you might be thinking, if you want happy read until the end, the happy is there, the storyline no longer can handle it, yeah the sex is gone I'm sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-30
Updated: 2013-06-30
Packaged: 2017-12-16 15:08:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/863406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SylphofScript/pseuds/SylphofScript
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“You loved him,” Rose stated plainly, matter-of-fact, entirely out of the blue and suddenly you felt pain.</p><p>“I loved him,” you agreed effortlessly, “I fucking flushed for that grey-skinned sack of grumpy horse shit and I never told him.”</p><p>***Currently being reworked. First part and second part now updated, rating updated, it ends on a cliffhanger but this is not the end, I swear! There's more to come!***</p>
            </blockquote>





	What You Left Behind

**Author's Note:**

> To those who have read this already! Some things have changed since the first time you read it, but there are more to come! I'm still working through it and some of it is going to be cut completely while other parts are going to be elaborated on. I decided to periodically put the new doc in since, with school, it's taking me a while to do.
> 
> Enjoy and don't think this is the end of it!

You were being tortured.

You couldn’t explain what by, couldn’t pinpoint what exactly it was that was torturing you, because you didn’t have the words. They were something like memories, but less like slightly faded pictures in your mind and more like sharp, clear replays of exact moments in your life—or the life you once lived. Every detail was perfect and of the utmost clarity; you were being haunted by your own mind and you couldn’t figure out why.

All you knew was that it _hurt._

 

\---

 

They would always come sharp and sudden—like an ice-cold dagger sliding up between your ribs and causing your heart to stop in its tracks. They left you aching, cold, and unsure of what had happened.

Sometimes you had a feeling they were coming, and sometimes they hit you when you were least expecting them to. Regardless, it always jarred you, left you feeling empty and wanting for something you had turned your back on and left behind. They were unavoidable and almost always unpredictable, and you couldn’t stand the way they snuck up on you like they did. But there was nothing you could do about them, not matter how hard you tried. And damn did you try.

Sometimes, you’d sit alone in your room while John was at work and think about the ones that had plagued you. Before long, they had become too numerous to really count, but there were always some that stuck with you more than the others. It was usually the stupid ones that stayed, and you cursed your mind over and over for not remembering the ones you wanted to with the clarity you remembered the others with. If you were being forced to remember, you at least wanted to remember the ones you _loved._

But, instead, you got what you were given, even if they hadn’t been the most impactful in your previous life.

The most recent one had been one of those.

You had been sitting in a particularly boring lecture sometime around Halloween in a college you were certain you paid your way into when this one had struck you. You probably should have had some sort of instinctual warning given by the time of the year alone, but you knew more than anyone how little you paid attention to the things that would hurt you later. So, because you had picked that moment to be utterly blind to the world around you, you had been taken completely off-guard when the person next to you broke out a bag of candy corn and began to eat it. You remembered staring at them, blinking from behind the tinted glasses you still wore out of habit more than anything, and then it hit you.

It was a short, simple memory. You had been aching to know what troll horns had tasted like, and you wondered desperately if it had anything to do with the little candies you now watched your fellow classmate slot into his mouth and eat. You remembered that they tasted nothing alike despite the uncanny similarities but the response you got when you had slid your tongue along them to satiate your curiosity had been worth the initial struggle. The memory had trailed off then—fading away with him shuddering from surprise and just a little something else as he moved in towards you to receive his end of that bargain—and you had been left to face the rest of the lecture with an uncomfortable tightness in your pants and a lump in your throat that had taken days to swallow.

You bought a bag of them after that but never ended up eating any, and no one in your apartment questioned you when you refused to throw them away.

That wasn’t the first of the memories, though. And it certainly wasn’t the last.

They happened e _verywhere._

One time, you were walking downtown when a man putting up a sign for a new shop stumbled under the weight of the wooden block and ended up being steadied by your passing arms. As he thanked you and pulled away his sleeve slipped up the tiniest of amounts, revealing a small tattoo on the inside of his wrist that you couldn’t have ignored if you tried. You felt your eyebrows shoot up as you noticed. He noticed you notice and his face soured slightly.

“It’s not a sixty-nine,” he told you defensively before you could say anything, as if you were even going to say anything about it in the first place. You had shaken your head in response, pushed your shades higher up on your nose, and told him that it was your favorite one of the twelve. He blinked a few times as he processed what you had said but you walked away before the conversation on his lips could start. You wouldn’t have been able to handle that. Not yet.

That one had been particularly jarring, having taken place not too long after your arrival back and right after you had moved into the relatively small two-bedroom apartment with Rose, Jade, and John, all of you having silently agreed that you needed each other to be nearby for when times like these became overwhelming.

It wasn’t long after that encounter that you and Rose had come upon a deal, and you left a little hole-in-the-wall shop a week later with matching bandages plastered to your collarbones and a bottle of lotion shared between you.

(Hers had healed faster than yours. You wondered what that meant, if it meant anything at all. It probably didn’t, but that didn’t stop you from wondering.)

They didn’t get easier as you got them—if anything they only got harder, only hit harder. At one point you had thought maybe they were evening out, that there was possibly a lull in the intensity of the memory shock and you were finally free from the pain your own mind had been inflicting upon you.

You had been wrong.

This one had been the worst, because no matter how hard you tried, you would never, ever have been able to see this one coming.

But god, you wish you had.

You had been sitting at your computer attempting to churn out a decently bullshitted essay on King Henry VIII and why he was an excellent icon for pimps all throughout the ages (hey, you  _had_  said it was bullshit) when it had happened. One of your more recent mixes had been playing in the background and you were absentmindedly judging whether or not it was ready for Jade when the sound from the old speakers had suddenly started to screech. The high-pitched whine had startled you enough that you uncharacteristically slammed your hand down on the keyboard in front of you and executed the entire Word document. An entire three-hour-block of work, and it was gone just like that.

You had never stopped to wonder if that was even _possible_. Your mind had already moved on before it had a chance to be critical.

Bullshitted or not, the loss of your work had pissed you off. Enraged, you slammed your open palm against the chunky old monitor of your computer and it retaliated by flickering and seemingly shutting off, the annoying screech faltering only momentarily before continuing on despite the lack of vision being presented from the screen. Rage unlike what you typically displayed welled up in your chest and you yanked your shades off to glare at the piece of machinery before setting them aside and slamming your now-empty hands onto the keyboard again, maybe hoping to right whatever you had done wrong the first time, though _that_ you knew that wasn’t possible. The noise didn’t stop.

The anger swelled further and you turned away with a whoosh, your hands balling into fists and your shade-less eyes searching around from something not owned by Egbert to smash against the wall. Just as you were reaching for the only thing you could find—some stupid pottery thing you had done when Rose and Jade had dragged you and John to a class in a vain attempt to do something “fun” together— it happened.

You hadn’t recognized it at first, the beginning bars low and angry sounding, like thunder rolling from steel-grey clouds, but as it started to pick up and lighten just the tiniest of amounts it registered in your brain like a shock of electricity. It sent your mind reeling and your body froze up in response, all of the anger that was plaguing your mind gone in an instant.

This was the song you had made for him.

You couldn’t unfreeze yourself, couldn’t turn to shut it off or even to pick your shades back up, you were entrapped by what the song was doing to you, despite the fact it had already been close to a year. You hadn’t listened to it since you had played it for him that one last time, his eyes on the floor and yours on his mouth, watching the way his pointed teeth dug into the skin of his lip, causing the blood to pool beneath the thin layer. You had known what that meant, and your eyes had travelled up his face, knowing what they would see there but needing to see it all the same. It was something you’d give anything to see now, to see the way he looked at you and the way it was obvious he—

“Dave?”

It was soft, but it was enough to break you out of the trance the song had on you, and you finally managed to turn. Rose stood in the doorway, her uncut hair bound by her jaw but failing to cover the small jade-colored Virgo symbol peeking from beneath the collar of her shirt. It was where your eyes always looked first. Your hand had unconsciously risen to touch your own version, but you stopped yourself before it could reach its destination. She noticed, though, and the concern on her pale face deepened. Her eyes bored into you and you found yourself unable to look up and meet them, and you mentally cursed as you suddenly remembered you weren’t wearing your shades. It was nothing Rose hadn’t seen before—you two had gotten as close as two long-lost siblings could have after returning from your session, the two of you creating a bond to fill the staggering voids in your chests you both now carried—but it still made you uncomfortable to be found without the thing you normally had on you like an extra appendage.

You knew she recognized the song, you had played it for her and Kanaya countless times as you tried to perfect it before finally presenting it to him as if you had just thrown it all together at a moment’s notice and decided it was for him. But she said nothing about it; her lips stayed pressed together in a line you used to associate with the deep shit you had managed to swan dive into when you had lived together on that hunk of rock hurtling through an unimaginable stretch of space. She stared at you with that look and you stared back, your face blank as slate but your eyes giving everything away without your sunglasses. You were an idiot for taking them off.

Just when you felt you had to say something (because you could no longer hold strong in an emotionally-charged staring contest now that everything you ever felt had been splattered against the wall you and Rose secretly created together in your minds over the past year) she moved, the arms that had been crossed across her chest falling to her sides and her hair swaying over the symbol to cover it fully. She reached you in a few quick and graceful steps, her slender neck craning to look up at you and yours bending to look down at her. She was tiny compared to you, tiny compared to Jade who had inherited a strangely seductive version of her grandfather’s gruff build, and to John who had never gone back to his younger days of cake and Gushers, instead pursuing his want to look like Nic Cage in that one dumb movie you could never fully pay attention to. She was tiny like the mother the both of you shared, though the steel in her eyes was not something you had ever witnessed before from Roxy.

(Though, to be fair, you had not been around Roxy long enough to witness anything like that. You had barely ever looked her in the face, she looked too much like something you had never had growing up but had desperately wanted deep in the abandoned crevices of your mind.)

Rose never acknowledged her size; not when she probably needed to and not now, though you were easily a foot taller than her. You watched as she raised a hand up to your neck and pushed aside the collar of your shirt, wincing only slightly when her finger brushed the symbol you had etched beneath there.

“I thought you got rid of this song,” she said. Her voice was still quiet.

“I thought I had too,” you replied. You thought you had deleted the file the moment you transferred all of the data you kept on you from those isolated years on the meteor to the old computer you picked up from a thrift shop, entirely done with the technology you had come back to before even trying to understand it and wanting to revert just a little. Or, that’s what you told yourself.

“It’s not one I would miss,” you told her and her eyes narrowed in suspicion. “ _Rose_ ,” you begged, “you know what this shit does to me. Why would I keep it around?”

She hesitated the slightest of amounts, as if pondering over what you said, though you knew she didn’t need to. Rose didn’t need to ponder; Rose always knew at a moment’s notice what it was she believed.

“You’re right,” she agreed. Her face softened and she brushed the pad of her thumb over your tattoo again. “We can’t afford to lose ourselves to what we had left behind.”

It hurt her too. You knew this. God how it hurt her.

The song rose in the final chorus, the notes hitting in ways that you knew made his eyes flutter shut so he could see the action in the darkness behind his eyelids. You choked out a snickering sob sort of thing quietly, involuntarily. He had been such a pansy.

“You loved him,” Rose stated plainly, matter-of-fact, entirely out of the blue and suddenly you felt pain. So much pain. You couldn’t hold it. She caught you as you curled over, your lean height wrapping easily somehow against the small frame of Rose Lalonde.

“I loved him,” you agreed effortlessly, something you’re sure others wouldn’t expect of you and your façade that you kept up for them as if to show the wounds the game gave you all could be overcome. (Rose was the only one who knew you now faked every ironic gesture. They were no longer on purpose.) The pain rose further and you felt your eyes burn. “I fucking flushed for that grey-skinned sack of grumpy horse shit and I never told him.”

Your words felt stale even as your lips curled around them, the unfamiliar terms clashing with the familiarity of the same that rang in your head. So long had you wanted to say them aloud, for them to mean something when you spoke them. They meant the world to you, but to the world they meant nothing, and it killed you inside.

“He knew, Dave. He had to have known,” Rose tried to reassure you and, even though you didn’t want it to, her voice was soothing and you were giving in to it without a fight. “You treated him in a way you never even treated Terezi. We all could see it, even he could.”

“But I never got to  _tell_ him,” you would have whined if your voice hadn’t been so thick with emotion.

“People miss out on things all the time and live with the regret of not acting.” She pulled you away to look into your face, hers stern beneath the comfort. “But that’s the thing, Dave.  _We live._  You will regret it forever, but Karkat wouldn’t have wanted you to throw everything away on a few lost words he knew you felt inside your heart.”

You hated it when she knew what Karkat would have wanted. You hated it more when you knew she was  _right_.

And Rose was always right.

Something jingled down the hallway, followed by the sound of oiled metal on metal that was the bolt of your front door being opened. That’s when you realized the song had ended.

“John’s home,” Rose whispered in your ear and gave you a peck on the cheek before pulling away and letting your collar slide back into place. You let her go because you couldn’t hold her back. John would think something’s wrong if you did, and you can’t sit through another “Cheer Up Dave!” movie marathon. You couldn’t tell him a lot of the movies he made you watch you knew Karkat would have also liked, either. That it was painful to sit through. John knew something had happened to you back in the game, just like something had happened to you all, but he didn’t know exactly what had broken you. He never asked, and you never told. You simply lived with the pain, trying to avoid it when you could but enduring when you couldn’t. You knew there was no way you could tell him, not like that. Rose knew this too, and she knew to take action to prevent it when you couldn’t. She smoothed down her shirt, glanced up at you one last time, and walked out of the room.

You heard the chatter in the hallway a minute or so later and knew John was efficiently distracted. You took advantage of it and moved to your bed, deciding to deal with everything at a later time. You ended up staying there the rest of the night, not wanting to move, too lost in your own thoughts to even try. You shooed away Rose when she came back to check on you, Jade when she called you for dinner, and Bec, now a truly normal dog by some way of post-game magic, when he brought you a slipper to cheer you up. You heard John when he finally came in to sleep for the night, though he tried to be quiet about the way he moved through your shared room. He didn’t bother you once before he slipped into his bed, and you were thankful for that.

 

\---

 

You woke up the next morning groggy. Your eyes itched and you were stiff from sleeping in your jeans all night. Your cheek stuck to your pillow when you pulled your head from it and you knew why. You had that dream again, the one you thought you had been free of, the one where you’re running into Karkat down the street and pulling him too you, ignoring the way he screeched that you were in public and clinging to him, your nose burying into the mess of black muss he called hair. You would tell him you flushed for him, that you loved him, and he would stop and look at you, frozen for just a moment as the confession processed, and then his cheeks would flush and his eyes would light up and you would prepare yourself for what you knew was coming. But just as his mouth would open in a response your mind would register a horn sticking up from his mop of hair and the greyness that was his skin and you would realize that it weren’t possible for a troll to have made it to Earth, and you would wake up without ever hearing what he wanted to tell you. What you would give anything to hear.

You hadn’t had that dream for weeks, more than a month, and yet it was back again.

You pushed the thought away, replacing it with one that told you you had to get to work before you got in trouble for being late. You listened to it, taking a quick shower before moving around the room and getting dressed quietly enough not to wake Egbert, who was snoring in his mussed sheets, one Superman-clad leg hanging over the side. Once dressed in your uniform, you wandered out of your shared room and down the hall to get your shoes. You nearly had a heart attack when Rose suddenly appeared in the archway that lead to the living room just as you were passing it.

“Jesus dicks!” you hissed loudly, pulling what you would relay to others as a graceful move (when in actuality you made anime reactions look bland) in shock. Her lips quirked up from the steely look she was wearing for a moment before settling back, but her eyes were laughing. You were about to give her a stern talking to when she thrust her hand at you, her lips now pulling into a devious smile as something glinted over the humor that was just in her eyes.

“You’ll be needed this today,” she told you, turning her fist up and opening it to reveal two crumpled twenties. You gave her a puzzled but amused look from behind your shades (that you know she saw anyway, somehow) and took them.

“You do realize I’m heading out to work right now, right?” you told her more than asked her, shoving the bills in your pocket because you didn’t feel like taking out your wallet. “I’m not going to be needing any money while I’m busy pouring my heart, sweat, and soul into people’s over-priced, heart-pumping, shit-I-shouldn’t-have-had-that-last-one-goodbye-cruel-world drinks.”

Damn the girl, she didn’t even wrinkle her nose. You had thought that might’ve been a good one, but apparently not. Rose was a tough audience anyway. You felt a vague, empty throb behind your heart, but pushed that away just like everything else that started to remind you of him. You weren’t having that today.

Instead reacting, Rose simply said, “You took money you don’t need.”

“You offered me money you knew I didn’t need,” you countered, and her smile quirked.

“Oh, I beg to differ.”

There it was again, that knowing glint in her eyes that caused you to drop the playful bantering tone for your special serious face (now with added frown instead of inquiring smirk; Rose had that effect on you).

“Lalonde,” you started, the use of the name contradicting your expression out of habit, “What are you not telling me?”

As if by magic (or total bullshit, you pick), the knowing glint in her eye jumped out and engulfed her face, starting at her mouth and transforming everything until she looked like the smug shit you knew she hid deep down in that strange place she called her mind and only pulled out for rare times like these when you would be willing to chew your own arm off just to know what it was she was keeping from you.

“I believe that’s for you to find out. Time will tell, Mr. Strider.” She winked at you then,  _winked_ at you, to complete the maddening routine. You knew all of you still had small parts of the gods you used to be hidden away, all of which would pop up at the most random of times, but fuck she had the most annoying one to deal with.

(For instance, you would suddenly find yourself with more time when you needed it and less time when you didn’t want to wait; Jade sometimes would find things she had been looking for on her bed, next to where she sat, or, on occasion, in her coffee; John was stuck with the random breeze assaulting him and the people around him, more often when he didn’t want it than when he did, always leaving him rumpled and grumpy; and Rose, Rose would suddenly know things. She wouldn’t be able to trigger them, and lord knows she’s been trying to find a way to, but when they came they were always broken down within a moment and analyzed, her mind still well-oiled to the process even after the time that’s passed.)

Frustrated, you gave her the full Strider pout that didn’t affect her one bit before turning away to get ready to serve coffee to pre-teens asking for their growth to be stunted and skinny-ass hipsters and disgruntled lackeys for the next eight hours. Oh, the joy of work. Your hand wrapped around the handle to the front door and twisted.

She stopped you right as you were walking out the door with a hand at your elbow. You tuned to see her looking amused, the smug glint far from gone but no longer being the control behind her expression.

“You sweat into their drinks?” she asked you with a small smile that dared. You gave your own version back.

“Gives flavor,” you informed her, and walked out the door.

 

\---

 

“Slutty nuns in the wrong kind of church,” you muttered to yourself as you loped down the sidewalk, people not getting out of your way despite the obvious rush you were in. You were late now, thanks to a certain ectosister of yours (and the fact you never left for work until the last possible moment but that had nothing to do with anything nope), and if you didn’t get your ass through those ugly green framed doors before that little digital four on your phone became a five your boss would have you in the backroom and cleaning out shit for the entire day.

In actuality, you had nothing to worry about, because the moment you walked into the shop (only 13.8 seconds late, you were ready to argue), your boss turned to you and, instead of ignoring the excuse you knew he knew you had and sending you into the backroom, he rushed over to you, hand out in front of him and pointer finger doing the thing it was named for. It wasn’t until he was only a few steps away from you that you realized he wasn’t pointing  _at_ you, he was trying to usher you back out the door.

“Not today, Strider,” he was telling you as he advanced, and it took you a moment to figure out what he was talking about. He went on without waiting for you to respond. “I’ve overclocked you and I don’t want you in today. Stacy’s requested the shift so you’re off. Get out of here.”

You blinked at him. He didn’t see it, your shades doing the job they were made for. (Well, what you considered them to be made for.)

“But—” you started, but he cut you off.

“Nope. Out. Come back in on Thursday.”

Thursday? But today was  _Monday._ You needed that tip money if you were going to do anything for the days you had off. You wouldn’t be able to stand sitting in your room for three whole days before Thursday rolled around. You needed—

No you didn’t. Rose had given you money.

Sure it was only forty dollars. But it was still money.

 _That_ was what she was hiding from you? That you’d have an unexpected couple of days off? That was the big secret?

Rose was losing it, you mused to yourself. Just like the rest of you, she was finally losing it. Your mind truly boggled at the thought, left you a little uneasy. If Rose was finally losing it, what did that say about the rest of you?

“Oh, wait.” Your boss’s voice pulled you from yourself, and you cocked your head a bit to glance back over your shoulder at his thoughtful expression. “There was someone in here for you. Earlier. Some guy.”

It didn’t faze you. A lot of people came to you when they needed something fixed but couldn’t find Jade to ask her themselves (another side effect of her god-hood, though that happened less frequently). You were easy to find, so they asked you instead.

“A guy, huh?”

“Yeah. Grumpy guy. Impatient when I told him you wouldn’t be in for another couple hours and that you’d only be around long enough for me to tell you you’re off today. Left in a huff without buying anything.”

You swallowed involuntarily at the description (it was always the first thing people told you when you admitted to seeing him) and tried to cover it up by talking again, “Did he leave any contact information?” Your voice was hopeful; you couldn’t help it, despite the impossibility. You knew deep down it wasn’t him, but even the idea of meeting someone like him made your heart skip a few beats.

You knew you were really fucked up deep down, but that didn’t stop you from finding him wherever you could, even when it wasn’t really him.

Your boss paused while you lost yourself in your own thoughts again, his brow furrowed. “Just his name,” he said after a moment. “Must be someone you already know or helped.”

You relaxed again despite the disappointment that bloomed somewhere in your gut, but it only lasted a moment, because you just had to ask a question you knew you shouldn’t, and it would send you back to panic with interest.

“What was his name?”

“Something weird,” your boss replied with a shrug. “Never heard of it before, so there was no possible way I’d remember it. Started with a C maybe? You’d know him, though, with a name and an attitude like that. Sounded like it was Asian or something, Middle—”

You were out the door before he could finish, the strap of your backpack clenched in a white-knuckled grip. Head snapping around, you searched the crowd as it flowed past the shop, bee-lining for either the crosswalk at the end of the road or, having already crossed it, getting away from it.

You were crazy. It had been hours ago. He was long gone. It might not even be him.

But you had to find out.

You didn’t even know where you were going.

“Hey!” a voice called from behind you, and you snapped your head (hello whiplash, ouch) to look over your shoulder, ignoring the pain that spread up your neck. It was your boss again. He looked almost… sympathetic. You didn’t have the mental capacity to wonder why. “He had a ticket in his hand. For that new comedy with that one guy in it. Stiller whatever.”

The Marquee. With barely a flutter of your fingertips as a thank you and heart downright palpitating, you turned heel and headed off. Your feet bounced against the hard pavement and your heart raced beneath your three layers of autumn clothing, but you didn’t slow down.  _You had to find him._

You knew, _knew_ it couldn’t be him, but you had to try.

It felt like hours of walking, days even, but fifteen minutes later you were standing in front of the giant sign of one of the “local” theatre (among the seven others; New York was not a small place), your chest heaving from more than just the brisk walk. The girl behind the counter gave you an odd look when you walked up, but before you could say anything you slapped down one of the twenties and asked for the romantic comedy whatever movie that was playing. Exact words.

The odd look deepened and, after a quick check to make sure the twenty wasn’t fake ( _A fake twenty? Really babe? I don’t have time for this._ ), followed you through the doors and ended once you were securely inside and out of her line of sight. Not that you noticed, your eyes were too busy frantically searching the names of the movies that hung above each separate theater entrance.

Fuck. What was the name of the movie? Why didn’t you actually look at the name?

What if you missed him?

“… Six,” the voice of the person facing you (whoa, when did they get there?) said, handing back the end stub of the ticket you hadn’t realized you’d given them.

“… What?” you asked dumbly.

“You’re in theater six?” they repeated and took on the look the girl at the ticket counter had given you. You ignored it and moved away, walking maybe a little too fast to theater number six. You didn’t have time for skepticism. Your mind hadn’t even captured the fact the movie should have been over and done with by now; he should have been long gone from the theater. Your mind was focused solely on the theater room you now stood before.

But then you couldn’t go in.

You were standing at the heavy red door with one hand wrapped tightly on the cold silver handle, but you couldn’t move. You had frozen again. You couldn’t go in.

Because your mind had finally caught up with the rest of you.

Because what if it wasn’t him?

Would you be able to handle the disappointment? Or would you have to stagger out to the nearest bench and veg out the hollow pain, waiting around until Rose figured out you weren’t coming home and sent out the search team to look for you?

(It pained you to admit that you had to be searched for at least once a week when you first got out of that hellish game. It pained you more when you remembered the looks on the faces of your three best friends when they did find you. The game had fucked with them, too, but you were the handful. You were the one who had to be taken care of the most. But you were also the one who pulled together and put on the “I’m okay, no, really” façade the fastest. It even out, you supposed, but relapse was not an option. You couldn’t put them through that again.)

You didn’t think you could handle it this time. No, you knew you couldn’t. You couldn’t.

Your hand dropped from the handle and you took a step back, head hanging and eyes staring in a pained shock at your own actions. Because you were so close.

You were so close.

No. No,  _you thought you were. You wished you were._

But you weren’t, and you couldn’t. It was too much, too soon. Time failed to erase what everyone had told you it would, and you didn’t have the capacity, be it mental or emotional, to handle the staggering disappointment yet again when you realized not for the first time that you had truly left everything behind when you walked out that door. It hurt too much.

You turned away. Took a few steps, paused, and then let out a small choke. His voice echoed in the back of your mind, reminding you how close you had been to staying with him forever. How small of a decision it would have been if he had only asked you to stay with him. If he had only held your hand a fraction of a second longer and effectively snapped your nerve to leave. You had been so close to being with him forever, no matter what the game had in store for those who didn’t accept their victory.

You had been _so close,_ and yet here you were, alone in a random New York movie cinema, chasing after ghosts and trying to find him where he would never be. The unfairness of it all seized you then and you felt your body sway, echoing with a flush from the bathroom beside you. You needed to get out of there.

A muffled sob choked you, your feet wouldn’t move. You shuddered a sigh, pressed your hand against the wall you nearly slumped against and whispered his name into the cheap plaster. You hadn’t been expecting an answer.

“Dave?”


End file.
